Tag Archives: Psychology

4s—From the Perspective of a 4

Posted on 03/18/2013 | 3 comments
Waves breaking at Porto Covo, west coast of Po...

Waves breaking (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This is a guest post from Connie Howard, who graciously agreed to share her perspective of being a 4.

Please check out her blog, Sorting it Out, which is full of wonderful writing, straight from the heart.

Thanks for the invitation, Joycelyn.

Being a 4, for me, is lovely, intense, and lonely all rolled into one. We go by a number of names: the Romantic, the Aesthete, the Individualist, the Artist, and the Melancholic. This last one isn’t exactly a name anyone would embrace eagerly, but it has some truth, and that truth, I’m coming to believe, may have something to do with our fast-paced, work-hard, play-hard, bottom-line oriented culture, which 4s don’t always fit into very well.

The name that perhaps resonates most strongly with me is the Aesthete. I experience thundering waves or towering ancient trees or the creamy skin of a newborn as achingly beautiful. And I’m a Romantic, yes, though I am also very, very practical and organized. I like my food saucy and spicy and served with wine in candle-lit rooms, but this does not mean I won’t enjoy plain food by fluorescent lighting too. Nor does being a romantic mean I don’t work hard.

I’m drawn to happy and sad and all things laced with magic. I prefer sad movies to frivolous or sentimental ones, though I love good comedy (which, to be truly good, must in my mind be rooted in the sad material of life.) I love to socialize, but it’s got to have an element of meaningful and substantial, and move beyond small-talk and trivia. I have, since childhood, been known to be a little earnest.

Envy

But first things first, the character flaw we are perhaps most well-known for, and the one I’ve been most frequently judged for—envy. First, envy is not at all the same as feeling insecure. This has so often been assumed I can’t stress it enough. It isn’t one tiny bit the same. I have often been envious of you, but never unsure of your loyalty to me.

Equally important, or maybe more important, envy never, ever means I don’t want you to have whatever it is I envy—it means only that I want it for myself also. Who wouldn’t envy and want your charismatic, magnanimous, agreeable personality? Who wouldn’t sometimes envy your beauty, your good health, your strength, your seemingly limitless ability to make others laugh, your energy and freedom to party and escape the darker side? Who wouldn’t sometimes feel daunted by your brilliant light? It’s a compliment, really.

And there’s also this: I don’t really dance with envy all that terribly much more than you do, not from what I can see. It seems to me that I just admit it more readily, so please don’t judge me too harshly. Besides, it’s not any worse, as character flaws and hurdles go, than the one you sometimes stumble on, just different.

I love what a wonderfully intuitive and empathetic fellow human being recently told me: Sometimes, when your pain or failure is juxtaposed with the robust health or success of another, what could possibly be more normal and human and emotionally honest than envy?  This I will remember, the next time someone suggests I ought to be above envy. I sometimes do want it all, and you might too sometimes, if you’re honest.

Difference

Okay, that’s a relief, to have explained that. The rest matters less. You may think me sensitive and a little flaky, but that’s okay with me. I perceive things you may not consider perceptible, yes. Noise, coming from physical clutter. The space around you as magnetic,  or impervious. Tears where there are none, tension or rage beneath a smile. Genuine empathy in your eyes before you say a word.

About you needing me to fit in when I may not—I don’t respond well to these attempted adjustments, no matter how much you’d like me to, so please don’t fall in love with me if you think you’re going to turn me into a sports fan. And please don’t fall in love with me if you’re going to tell me to dress differently either. What I wear reflects exactly what I need and how I feel. It’s just not me, to be in costume in order to please you.

So we’re not necessarily the best office-tower cubicle material as 4s, no, but we’re warm and compassionate and intuitive and empathetic. We’re good care-givers, therapists, healers. And we’re good friends and partners, if you can accept that we can’t and don’t want to be in this world exactly as you are.

Intensity

As to those intense feelings we sometimes have that might lead you to believe we’re being dramatic—I’m actually usually pretty stoic about my pain. But ironically, whether I’m being stoic or wearing my pain on my sleeve, my pain can be a problem for you.

If I wear it on my sleeve, it is often viewed as attention-seeking, and as a choice to hold on to the Awful Thing of many months ago, to which I say this: You may not be as conscious of it as I am, but you’re still sad too, about your own Awful Thing. I see it in how hard you try to shop and party and work and cheer and pray it into oblivion. I’m just more aware of the currents beneath the surface.

Ironically though, if I’m stoic about my pain, you may conclude I no longer have any, and then expect too much of me, which will irritate me immensely when the facts are shouting otherwise.

I am truly sorry about the dark clouds of failure and shame that occasionally blow in; this is perhaps the darkest part of my shadow. I can see how these would be very difficult for those with front-row seats to witness, and you are a saint for not judging me during those times. For this I love you immensely and will forever be loyal.

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No escape, no effort…no despair

Posted on 02/18/2013 | 2 comments
Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895-1986)

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895-1986) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Here’s an excerpt from a piece in one of the Krishnamurti Foundation Bulletins that Krishnamurti dictated in 1970.It’s titled, “The Problem of Living.” When he speaks about how we act from our centre (center), he seems in this case to be describing how we act from our compulsion.

“As one can observe, we have always acted from a centre—a centre which contracts and expands. Sometimes it is a very small circle and at other times it is comprehensive, exclusive and utterly satisfying. But it is always a centre of grief and sorrow, of fleeting joys and misery, the enchanting or the painful past. It is a centre which most of us know consciously or unconsciously, and from this centre we act and have our roots. The question of what to do, now or tomorrow, is always asked from the centre and the reply must always be recognizable by the centre. Having received the reply either from another or from ourselves, we proceed to act according to the limitation of the centre. It is like an animal tethered to a post, its action depending on the length of the tether. This action is never free and so there is always pain, mischief and confusion.

“Realizing this, the centre says to itself: how am I to be free, free to live happily, completely, openly, and act without sorrow or remorse? But it is still the centre asking the question. The centre is the past. The centre is the ‘me’ with its selfish activities which knows action only in terms of reward and punishment, achievement or failure, and its motives, causes and effects. It is caught in this chain and the chain is the centre and the prison.

“There is another action which comes when there is a space without a centre, a dimension in which there is no cause and effect. From this, living is action. Here, having no centre, whatever is done is free, joyous, without pain or pleasure. This space and freedom is not a result of effort and achievement, but when the centre ends the other is.

“But we will ask how can the centre end, what am I to do to end it, what disciplines, what sacrifices, what great efforts am I to make? None. Only see without choice the activities of the centre, not as an observer, not as an outsider looking inward, but just observe without the censor. Then you may say: I cannot do it, I am always looking with the eyes of the past. Be aware, then, of looking with the eyes of the past, and remain with that. Don’t try to do anything about it; be simple and know that whatever you try to do will only strengthen the centre and is a response of your own desire to escape.

“So there is no escape, no effort and no despair. Then you can see the full meaning of the centre and the immense danger of it, and that is enough.“

–J. Krishnamurti
Meeting Life

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Types and Stereotypes

Posted on 02/11/2013 | 4 comments
Latina: Systema taxinomicum

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Any system or method of classifying people has the potential to be used in harmful ways. But classifying things—and people—is one of the ways in which we organize and make sense of the world. Our brains do a certain amount of classifying on their own without our conscious intervention. If they didn’t have that ability, we wouldn’t have survived long enough to have this discussion. It isn’t possible or even desirable to dispense with our classifying behavior.

In order to classify, the first thing we do is observe. From our observations, we then make generalizations. Based on our generalizations, we create classifications.

In terms of the physical/material world, it’s good to know which classifications of mushrooms are safe to eat and which are not, which insects have a deadly sting and which are harmless, which sounds and smells signal danger and which are innocuous.

In terms of people, things can get a bit dicey. We have all kinds of classifications for people based on nationality, religion, race, gender, age, level of education, type of car people drive, whether or not they have children, physical appearance, the language they use, whether or not they just cut you off in traffic, where they live, and even whether or not you know them. We also, of course, classify people by their personalities or temperaments. The Greek physician Hippocrates is the first person we know of to come up with this way of classifying people. Carl Jung may be the most well-known for “typing” people as a result of the MBTI (Myers Briggs Type Inventory) based on his work.

NEITHER GOOD NOR BAD

Although there are some people who object to being classified by personality type, in general typing does not have the bad rap that stereotyping does. But in fact, typing and stereotyping are really the same thing. And I don’t think the problems we encounter with the misuse of typing are a result of stereotyping.

“What people call ‘stereotypes’ are what scientists call ‘empirical generalizations,’ and they are the foundation of scientific theory. That’s what scientists do; they make generalizations. Many stereotypes are empirical generalizations with a statistical basis and thus on average tend to be true. If they are not true, they wouldn’t be stereotypes (emphasis his).”

–Satoshi Kanazawa, Psychology Today

Most of us think that stereotyping people is wrong. I think it’s wrong. Or at least I did until very recently when I started to investigate the concept and came to the conclusion that it isn’t stereotyping that’s the problem. As Kanazawa says, “stereotypes are observations…neither good nor bad, desirable nor undesirable, moral nor immoral.” The problem is that we use stereotyping the wrong way. You could even say we abuse stereotyping.

The first way in which we abuse or misuse stereotyping is that we tend to forget about individual exceptions. Just because something is true in general for an entire group of people (let’s call it Group Type A) doesn’t mean it is true for every single individual within Group Type A. The generalization still applies—it just doesn’t necessarily apply to the particular person from Group Type A you happen to be talking to or working with or in a relationship with.

The second way in which we misuse stereotyping is by using stereotypes against people. The most egregious examples are racism, sexism, religious persecution, and the like. But we also use personality stereotypes against other people.

“Stereotypes tell us what groups of people tend to be or do in general; they do not tell us how we ought to treat them.”

But isn’t that one of the points—and benefits—of learning about systems like the Enneagram? To know how to get along with different types of people? It’s kind of a conundrum, isn’t it?

OUR BIASES ARE ALWAYS SHOWING

Difficulties arise because the “empirical generalizations” that underlie systems like the Enneagram are viewed by each of us through our own set of filters, biases, opinions, judgments, personal experiences, and type. We don’t live our lives as scientists, examining the world through a microscope and trying to be as objective as possible before proceeding from one step to the next. We make snap judgments, we jump to conclusions, we react emotionally. Inevitably conflicts arise or someone says or does something we don’t like. It may be tempting, if we know about the Enneagram, to blame behavior we don’t like on the other person’s personality type. And to let them know we’re on to them.

Using the Enneagram to understand other people better is one thing, but throwing someone’s Enneagram type in his or her face is never OK. Even if someone behaves stereotypically, we can’t be certain their behavior wasn’t the result of something totally unrelated to type. We can never fully know someone else’s story. If we judge them solely on their personality type, we’re doing ourselves, the other person, and even the Enneagram a huge disservice.

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In the Shadow of Type 6: Deviance

Posted on 02/08/2013 | 12 comments
English: Do not deviate from the path!

Do not deviate from the path! (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

You can count on 6s. They are the folks you want to have in the trenches: dutiful, sensible, prepared, steadfast, loyal, reliable, conscientious, thorough, stalwart, and enduring. They will keep putting one foot in front of the other to see the job through. They appreciate structure, know how to follow the rules, and cooperate with others.

6s want things to work out for the best. They’re not convinced that’s actually going to happen, of course, but they will do whatever they can to keep themselves and others on the straight and narrow path to a positive—or at least not disastrous—outcome. If you want caution thrown to the wind, don’t ask a 6 to do the tossing.

As with all types, however, there’s a flip side to this picture. It takes a lot of effort—sometimes positively Herculean effort, in fact—and some mental gymnastics in order to keep on keeping on.

You Devil, You

In The Enneagram Spectrum of Personality Styles, Jerome Wagner describes projection as the primary defense mechanism of 6s:

You project onto others your own sense of disobedience and rebellion. Other people are trying to get away with things, and you need to monitor their activities and bring them in line with your authority’s principles, or others are trying to trip you up and trap you.

Deviance is antithetical to all the positive characteristics possessed by 6s. Yet 6s do rebel—at least internally—at maintaining the steadfast, responsible, and reliable persona they work overtime to project. It’s understandable. Not only are they constantly straining to determine what others expect from them—and then to deliver it—they also have to listen to the jibber jabber of their inner committee’s running commentary about…everything!

Who wouldn’t want to turn off the phone and burrow under the covers or take the money and run and let someone else deal with the consequences this one time?

I Can Do That!

You can’t be all things to all people.
You can’t do all things at once.
You can’t do all things equally well.
You can’t do all things better than everyone else.
Your humanity is showing just like everyone else’s.

–Eleanor Roosevelt

Objectively speaking, no one would disagree that trying to be all things to all people and do everything at once is impossible. But objectivity is hard to come by for the person who’s in the middle of the massive spider web this particular compulsion tends to weave. And the middle of the web is the vantage point from which others are viewed and judged to be either allies or antagonists. The antagonists bear the brunt of 6s projections.  I’m being responsible; they’re being irresponsible. I’m being reliable; they’re being inconsistent. I’m thorough; they’re sloppy.

Enlist some Listeners

In The Wisdom of the Enneagram, Don Riso and Russ Hudson have several good suggestions for 6s, including this one:

While you want to be there in a responsible way for everyone else in your life, you tend to shortchange yourself by not believing that your own self-development is worth the trouble. This can be exacerbated by fears of change—of moving into the unknown. Take risks, especially when it comes to moving out of familiar, safe patterns. Having a therapist that you trust or a spiritual group that you work with can be invaluable for creating the kind of support you need to explore difficult issues. But remember, it is your own courage and strength that ultimately are required (and available) for such explorations.

Any type can benefit from having a person or a group to listen non-judgmentally and provide feedback, but I think this may be especially helpful for 6s who often have trouble quieting their minds enough to be able to listen to themselves.

6s might also benefit from finding an outlet for their rebellious streak, as soon as they admit they have one. Deviating from the path once in a while might be a start.

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Posted in Habit, Shadow, Type 6

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The Resilience of 4s

Posted on 02/04/2013 | 2 comments
Inner World

Inner World (Photo credit: sea turtle)

I was recently pondering out loud with a friend how the compulsions of our type are sometimes a perfect match with the circumstance or situation we find ourselves in. In that moment we fit the job/situation like a fine, hand-tailored, leather glove. No one else could do what we do—or do it as well as we could.

Then there are other times when the compulsions of our type are diametrically, or at least significantly, opposed to what is wanted and needed in the moment. We are the square peg trying to fit into the round hole. Not even a close match. The old adage if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail applies.

A short time later, I began rereading Man’s Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl’s account of his experiences in Auschwitz and his development of what he called logotherapy, an attempt to shed light on the meaning of human existence and man’s search for meaning. Fifty-some pages into the book, I had to get up from my comfy chair to get a highlighter pen. What I was reading struck such a chord with me because of my recent post on the shadow of type 4 and the subsequent comments of a reader.

We both agreed that for various reasons 4s can have a difficult time in our Western culture, which doesn’t often value what they bring to the table. What got me out of my chair was Frankl’s description of some of the personal characteristics and tendencies of those prisoners who managed to best cope with life in a concentration camp. And, surprise of surprises, the people he described were clearly 4s:

Sensitive people who were used to a rich intellectual life may have suffered much pain (they were often of a delicate constitution), but the damage to their inner selves was less. They were able to retreat from their terrible surroundings to a life of inner riches and spiritual freedom. Only in this way can one explain the apparent paradox that some prisoners of a less hardy make-up often seemed to survive camp life better than did those of a robust nature. …

The intensification of inner life helped the prisoner find a refuge from the emptiness, desolation and spiritual poverty of his existence, by letting him escape into the past. When given free rein, his imagination played with past events, often not important ones, but minor happenings and trifling things. His nostalgic memory glorified them and they assumed a strange character….

As the inner life of the prisoner tended to become more intense, he also experienced the beauty of art and nature as never before. Under their influence he sometimes even forgot his own frightful circumstances.

This seemed amazing to me—and at the same time understandable after I thought about it. I know people who don’t have the type of inner life Frankl was talking about, and some of them experience that lack as a kind of suffering in itself. My own experience is that when I am in the best psychological shape, I spend more time daydreaming without it detracting from what I want to or need to do. In fact, daydreaming can have a very positive effect on my productivity (productivity being extremely important to an 8).

I asked Connie Howard (a 4) to read a draft of this post, which she was kind enough to agree to, and one of the things she said was:

I do sometimes see (in 4s I know) this contradiction: sensitive and melancholy and pessimistic on the one hand, and very adaptable and surprisingly strong and hopeful on the other.  On the occasions (during the course of my cancer) where I wasn’t able to hold things together, the feedback I got was surprise that I hadn’t come apart more often. Perhaps it’s kind of a 4 thing to conclude that intense experiences are both the most horrid and the best things to have had happen… a contradiction, I know!

I can see how the ability to retreat into one’s inner world and the past can in some circumstances be absolutely the best possible response—a response other types can and do make to one extent or another, but which 4s seem to be the very best at making. 4s’ inner strength may not always be recognized by other types, but that’s our loss.

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No Explanation Needed

Posted on 01/21/2013 | 3 comments
No One Is to Blame

No One Is to Blame (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I previously wrote a post for one of my other blogs about the idea that everything happens for a reason. There are a couple of odd things about this notion. For one, we tend to apply it only to unpleasant events and not to pleasant ones. For another, it carries an implication that the bad thing that has happened will in some mysterious way lead to something good.

Horrendous things do happen in the world, and everything happens for a reason is a proverb that’s meant to comfort. But it’s indicative of a worldview that bears examining. For one thing, it can be used as a palliative response that ignores the underlying cause of the situation or event, in which case it’s worse than useless.

Many of us habitually explain our current difficulties, bad habits, negative outlook, or troublesome behavior by referring back to our childhoods or other events from the past. Negative traits, behaviors, circumstances, or events require some kind of an explanation, even if it’s the not very satisfactory everything happens for a reason.

But how often do we explain our present good fortune, good habits, positive outlook, or admirable behavior by referring back to our childhoods or events from our past? We may recognize and even acknowledge luck and the kindness and generosity of others when we’re treated to it. But by and large, we don’t look for explanations for our positive traits, behaviors, or circumstances. We expect the good stuff; the bad stuff is an aberration.

Are you prompt, kind, generous, trustworthy, responsible, productive, optimistic, helpful, imaginative, creative, insightful, cheerful, broad-minded, well-read, accomplished or successful (at anything), happy, healthy, generally law-abiding, thoughtful, courageous, tolerant, objective, conscientious, or cooperative? Whatever positive characteristics you have, do you spend much time questioning how you got them?

THE WAY WE ARE

One of the great benefits of the Enneagram is that it shows us that, to a significant extent, we are the way we are because…that’s just the way we are. We were born with the temperament and the tendencies we have. It’s easy to give up the search for explanations for what we thought were our own individual quirks and proclivities once we discover how many other people who have very little, if anything, in common with us also have the very same quirks and proclivities.

When we give up the exhausting, stuck-in-place examination into our backgrounds to try to figure out why we are the way we are, we can begin to accept what and who we are and go on from there.

I wonder if we might not achieve the same result by starting to look for explanations not for the negative but for everything positive in ourselves and in our lives. I’m not talking about being grateful. I’m not advocating always looking on the bright side or maintaining a positive attitude. I’m suggesting we analyze everything that’s positive the same way we habitually analyze the things we define as negative as a way to break out of the habit of looking for explanations. Unless we’re really and truly trying to understand something and/or learn from an experience, simply trying to figure out why something is what it is isn’t particularly fruitful.

Focusing our attention on explaining the negative stuff leads to taking the stuff that’s OK—or even really good—for granted or assigning it less value than we assign the negative stuff. The underlying assumption is that good (at least our definition of it) should be the steady state and therefore good requires no examination. If things are not good, however, someone or something is to blame.

Most of us know from experience that observing ourselves without judgment, blame, or searching for explanations doesn’t come naturally. And the habit of judging, blaming, and searching for explanations extends outward into the world. But isn’t there anything better–or more product or even more enjoyable–that we could be doing with all the time, attention, and energy we spend on these futile activities?

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In the Shadow of Type 2: Neediness

Posted on 01/11/2013 | 10 comments
We Need Help

We Need Help (Photo credit: Alain-Christian)

2s see themselves as caring, sympathetic, kind, nurturing, friendly, giving, compassionate, warm-hearted, and above all, helpful.

2s make good friends. Having a 2 in your corner can be very reassuring. They will readily offer their assistance—sometimes even before the other person is aware he or she needs it. 2s’ sense of self-worth depends upon how valuable they are to others, or how valuable they perceive themselves to be.

Everyone needs a helping hand from time to time, and we can probably agree that there isn’t enough genuine altruism in the world. So it’s easy to applaud the selfless behavior of 2s. It’s also sometimes easy to take advantage of it since 2s really, really want others to like them.

The Flip Side

Of course, as with all the types, there’s a catch. If 2s aren’t acknowledged for all they do and recognized for the important role they play, they may either turn into martyrs or lash out at the very people they had previously lavished their love and attention on.

In The Enneagram Spectrum of Personality Styles, Jerome Wagner lists repression as the primary defense mechanism of 2s:

Because your own needs make you anxious, you keep them out of your awareness by repressing them. You project your needs onto others (so other people are needy, but you aren’t).

Needy is kind of a loaded term. There are people all over the world in need of the most basic elements of survival: food, water, shelter, clothing, and personal safety. They are undeniably needy, or at least in need. Then there are those of us who haven’t experienced those kinds of needs and aren’t likely to.

But emotional needs are important, too. The mental health profession makes an interesting distinction between needs and neediness. Becoming aware of and expressing one’s needs is a positive thing. Being a needy person, however, is generally viewed negatively. On top of that, we have the cultural dissonance (somewhat reflected in the divisiveness of U.S. politics) that applauds both self-reliance and toughing it out, on the one hand, and concern for the less-fortunate, on the other.

Everyone of us needs to show how much we care for each other and, in the process, care for ourselves.

–Princess Diana

In a way, 2s reflect our society’s discomfort and ambivalence about needs, neediness, and needy people. Although quick to identify, sympathize with, and respond to others’ needs, they relegate their own needs to the shadowland. In a way, they tend to themselves by tending to others. But, of course, that indirect route isn’t really very satisfying for either party.

Don Riso and Russ Hudson (The Wisdom of the Enneagram) suggest 2s examine their motives:

Twos tend to give too much and then regret it. Be brutally honest with yourself about your motives when you do anything for anyone. Learn to doubt your own rationales. Learn to listen to your body and your heart: when both ache, you know that you are hurting, and giving more to others so that they will appreciate you will not ultimately heal that hurt. On the other hand, closing down and cutting off ties with others will not solve the problem, either. Only brutal honesty about your intentions and your needs will do.

I’m not so sure about the being “brutally” honest part. Many 2s are carrying around a huge bag of unmet needs, so I think they need to be gentle with themselves. Getting into the habit of asking, “What do I need in this situation—or right now?” can help them slow down, settle down, and learn to focus inward, rather than outward.

The irony for 2s is that acknowledging their own needs—and being straightforward and honest about getting them met—can actually lead to the deeper, more intimate connections they crave. The more they take care of themselves, the more they will be able to freely offer themselves to others, and the more likely they are to develop the genuine friendships and relationships they are looking for.

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Only the Shadow Knows

Posted on 01/02/2013 | 10 comments
shadow on sidewalk

shadow on sidewalk (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In A Little Book on the Human Shadow, Robert Bly calls our shadow “the long bag we drag behind us.” He describes a process whereby children, beginning at the age of 2, start stuffing aspects of themselves into this bag that others (primarily parents at that point) do not like or approve of. Parents being individuals, however, each one tends to have his or her own temperament, expectations, personal history, and likes and dislikes. So the same behavior could—depending on the proclivities of the parent—be rewarded, ignored, or punished. Luck of the draw, really.

If you accept the idea that our Enneagram type is the result of our early experiences, particularly our relationship with our parents, this all fits together nicely. But we know that who we become is a result of nature and nurture. Our Enneagram stance (aggressive, withdrawing, or compliant), if not our actual type, is likely innate. So then where does the shadow come from?

Carl Jung points us in a different direction:

Whereas the contents of the personal unconscious are acquired during the individual’s lifetime, the contents of the collective unconscious are invariably archetypes that were present from the beginning. …The archetypes most clearly characterized from the empirical point of view are those which have the most frequent and the most disturbing influence on the ego. These are the shadow, the anima, and the animus. The most accessible of these, and the easiest to experience, is the shadow, for its nature can in large measure be inferred from the contents of the personal unconscious.

He also wrote:

The collective unconscious is a part of the psyche which can be negatively distinguished from a personal unconscious by the fact that it does not, like the latter, owe its existence to personal experience and consequently is not a personal acquisition.

While the personal unconscious is made up essentially of contents which have at one time been conscious but which have disappeared from consciousness through having been forgotten or repressed, the contents of the collective unconscious have never been in consciousness, and therefore have never been individually acquired, but owe their existence exclusively to heredity.

The Cat–er, the shadow–is out of the bag

So rather than being a bag we pack as we are growing up, and then must unpack as adults, our shadow, like our type, is innate to us. This view seems much more logical to me since it appears at least part of our shadow is directly related to our type.

At one of the IEA Conferences I attended several years ago, Jerome Wagner, author of The Enneagram Spectrum of Personality Types, gave an outstanding and highly entertaining presentation on shadow issues and defense mechanisms. (His take on the formation of the shadow seems to align more with Robert Bly’s view, but that  isn’t critical for our purposes.) Jung wrote that it is easy for other people to see when someone is projecting his or her own qualities onto another person. That was amply demonstrated when Jerry had his audience, as a group, create two lists for each type: one under the heading I Am and the other under the heading I Am Not.

Under I Am, we listed keywords describing the positive qualities of each type—the way that type preferred to see itself. And under I Am Not, we listed keywords describing all the qualities that type refused to accept (either denied or projected onto others). I’ve since added to both lists for all nine types and have found this material to be extremely useful personally, as well as in a variety of settings.

As Jung wrote (quoted above) the nature of the shadow can be inferred from the contents of the personal unconscious. He added, that it can be seen through and recognized fairly easily.

So let’s see what we recognize when we explore our shadow issues.

Coming up: the shadow and type 1.

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